The Rev. Danny Wood, senior pastor of Shades Mountain Baptist Church in Vestavia Hills, and the Rev. Michael Wesley Sr., senior pastor of Greater Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church in West End, will be leaving Sunday for a 10-day mission trip to India, where they plan to speak to more than 200 pastors in a three-day seminar.

“We’re trying to encourage ministers on the ground there to remain faithful to the gospel,” Wesley said.

Christian Service Mission Executive Director Tracy Hipps and Jeremy Griem, minister of Global Ministries at Shades Mountain Baptist, will go on the trip as well, invited by a missionary in India supported by Shades Mountain Baptist Church, Wesley said.

“It’s part of their global missions ministry,” Wesley said. “Our mission statement is to reach the world for Christ. We are interested reaching people and sharing the gospel all over the world.”

Wood and Wesley and their congregations have been working together for several years, trying to create a collaboration between a suburban church and inner-city church.

“Relationships have built and expanded,” Wesley said. “We’re on the verge of something more substantial.

We want to show that valuable, fruitful relationships are possible in Birmingham. We’re not just talking, we’re doing it.”